Saturday, September 13, 2008

Political Prohibition

So, I am on a self imposed weeklong prohibition from watching or reading or hearing anything related to the residential campaign, because I was getting too worked up. I would just be furious all the time, and I didn't want to be furious anymore. This article explains why:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/13/opinion/13sat1.html?ref=opinion

Please nation, get some sense into your fucking heads. We are not electing a high school class president, this is not homecoming court. This is not MTV's Sweet 16. This is an election for the PRESIDENT AND VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. The most powerful and dangerous positions in the world.

Now you make think, dangerous? Consider if I had a machine gun, and I walked into a crowded place determined to kill as many people as possible, how many people would I kill? 100? 200? Liberal estimates I think. Now think of all the people in the United States who will die in the next four years unless they do not obtain adequate healthcare. With 40 million Americans without healthcare, and millions more with healthcare that doesn't cover their health, any president who doesn't change this situation is dangerous.

Think of all the people, American and otherwise, who will die because of unnecessary wars waged by this country, unless we stop waging war out of preference and reserve war for only those extreme times when our families, our land, and our lives will be taken without resort to war. Any president who doesn't change this situation is dangerous.

Obama offers a specific set of policy initiatives that breathe new life into the American experiment and offer hope to millions of Americans for whom the experiment has failed, is failing, and will continue to fail these millions and millions more should nothing change.

What is John McCain going to do? How will he fix healthcare, and how is that different from everything else that has been talked about by previous president up until now? How will his plan result in all Americans obtaining health care? How will his plan ensure that Americans not just have healthcare, but healthcare that covers their health? How will he do it?

What else will John McCain do? How will he ensure that American does not enter into wars that should not be waged? How is his plan different from the current president? What criteria would he use when considering whether to deploy our armed forces?

I think the only answers are respectively, whatever it takes, and extreme caution.